DealerFire Transforms Customer Service with Salesforce Desk.com, Achieves Unprecedented ROI

SAN FRANCISCO, July 15, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM), the world's #1 CRM platform, today announced that DealerFire transformed its customer service to achieve a 1,262 percent return on investment (ROI) in six weeks using Salesforce Desk.com, according to independent research. DealerFire, a leading custom automotive web design and Internet marketing firm, gained a competitive advantage by standardizing its service on Desk.com, the all-in-one customer support app for fast-growing companies. DealerFire recently won the Technology ROI Award from Nucleus Research and was recognized for deploying an IT solution that produces a positive, bottom-line financial ROI.

Comments on the News

• "Fast-growing companies like DealerFire are using customer service to differentiate their brand and scale for growth," said Leyla Seka, GM and SVP, Desk.com, salesforce.com. "The DealerFire team was able to achieve unprecedented ROI by rapidly deploying Desk.com and scaling the solution over time. What they have been able to accomplish is a model for other small businesses poised for growth."
• "In our highly competitive business, we can't afford for any customer communications to fall through the cracks," said Corey Maertz, director of support, DealerFire. "Every team member now has the right tools to drive customer communications from start to finish, delivering engaged, hands-on customer service. With Desk.com, DealerFire has seen a definite ROI and can attribute business growth to our reputation for exceptional customer service."
• "DealerFire is an example of how IT investments closely aligned to business goals can deliver significant ROI and take full advantage of Salesforce Desk.com," said Rebecca Wettemann, vice president, Nucleus Research. "Nucleus found the Desk.com cloud application and its customer self-service portal enabled DealerFire to grow its business through greater productivity, greater visibility and greater client satisfaction."

Customer Service is the Competitive Advantage

More than 50 percent of small businesses fail in the first five years, according to the Small Business Administration. To avoid being among this statistic, small businesses must differentiate themselves by delivering exceptional customer service to outpace the competition and drive growth. Until Desk.com, small businesses had to choose between legacy support solutions that require dedicated IT resources or point solutions that lack the ability to scale as a company grows.

Small businesses are realizing that providing amazing customer service is a competitive advantage, which in turn helps grow their businesses. In fact, this is the #1 priority for emerging businesses, according to a recent Desk.com customer survey.

Fast-Growing Companies Succeed with Desk.com

DealerFire, a fast-growing company that specializes in providing web design and Internet marketing to the automotive industry, needed a solution that would allow it to manage and track client communications quickly and efficiently. Previously, client requests were handled ad hoc via manual tracking. DealerFire deployed Desk.com to support its client work order allocation, tracking and customer service. Desk.com was chosen because of its ease of use, cloud capabilities and flex pricing would easily scale with DealerFire.

Deploying Desk.com has enabled DealerFire to streamline the management of client projects and provide greater visibility into project progress for both internal account managers and outside clients, according to a study by Nucleus Research. With Desk.com, DealerFire was able to achieve:

• Increased Productivity: With one centralized system to allocate and track projects, support team members spend less time checking on project progress, enabling them to take on more cases and support growth without a commensurate increase in staff.
• Greater Sales Visibility: Account managers can now see the progress on any client account, allowing them to identify new sales opportunities and be knowledgeable about any pending work when they reach out to clients.
• Improved Client Satisfaction: In addition to greater visibility for sales, the Desk.com powered customer self-service portal enables clients to access information on a projects progress anywhere and from any device, increasing visibility into DealerFire's progress on their work.

Desk.com is the all-in-one customer support app that empowers fast-growing companies to instantly deliver awesome customer support across all channels—phone, email, web and social media. Fast-growing companies such as HotelTonight, One Kings Lane and SoundCloud are using Desk.com to deliver amazing customer support. Desk.com customers on average experience a 42 percent faster response to customers, 38 percent increase in agent productivity, 27 percent decrease in support costs and 36 percent increase in customer satisfaction, according to a Desk.com commissioned research. The full report, "Desk.com Customer Survey: Results & Analysis," is available here.  

Calculating the ROI

To determine the ROI, Nucleus Research calculated the initial and ongoing costs of software license subscription fees and personnel time over a three-year period to quantify DealerFire's total investment in Desk.com. Indirect benefits quantified included the increase in productivity associated with reducing the time to manage a case and the increase in sales productivity because of more rapid access to project information. An additional indirect benefit, improved customer satisfaction, resulted in additional savings because of the incoming calls that were deflected because of self-service.

Companies that receive the Nucleus Research ROI Awards demonstrate the link between IT strategy and business goals. For DealerFire, this meant managing client demands for customer service. The deployment of Desk.com resulted in a 1,262 percent ROI and full project payback within six weeks, as determined by Nucleus Research.

Pricing and Availability

• Salesforce Desk.com is generally available today with pricing starting at $30 per month, per agent.
• The Desk.com mobile app for iPhone and iPad is now generally available for download at the Apple App Store. Support for Android devices will be available in the fall of 2014.
• For a limited time, companies that switch from Zendesk to Desk.com can receive Desk.com free of charge for the remainder of 2014, some restrictions apply.
• Additional information for customers wishing to switch to Desk.com is available at http://help.desk.com/plus-free-for-2014.

Additional Information

• The Nucleus Research report is available at: http://help.desk.com/DealerFire-ROI
• Learn more about Desk.com at: http://www.desk.com/why
• Follow @Desk on Twitter
• Click to Tweet: @DealerFire achieved 1262% ROI by using @Desk http://www.desk.com/blog/customer-spotlight-how-dealerfire-gets-1262-roi-with-desk-com/
• Like Desk.com on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Desk

About Nucleus Research

Nucleus Research is a global provider of investigative, case-based technology research and advisory services that provide real-world insight into maximizing technology value. For more information, visit NucleusResearch.com or follow us on Twitter @NucleusResearch.

About Desk.com

Desk.com, a division of salesforce.com, is the all-in-one customer support app for fast-growing companies.

About salesforce.com

Salesforce.com is the world's largest provider of customer relationship management (CRM) software. For more information about salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM), visit: www.salesforce.com.

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